A look back at 1991’s home win over S.F. — Fireworks in the Dome (1 Viewer)

[St.Dan]

Stumbled upon this a few days ago while toggling through other pregame material for this week’s game. The 1991 home date with our then-division rival.

Hebert was injured and the offense was led by Steve Walsh for six games. We won just two of them, but thankfully one of them was this defen struggle. Montana was out for nearly two seasons after taking a crunching sack in the previous season’s NFCCG. Young was also out for this one and the Niners were led by Steve Bono.

The game was most memorable for a small fire up in the Dome rafters, caused by a fireworks display at halftime. Enjoy!

 

[Saint Kamara]

Fun fact:. The 1991 Saints team led at some point in the 4th quarter of all 16 regular season games. Only the first game of the season were they behind heading into the 4th quarter. All too often the offense would go absent in the 4th and the defense couldn't hold up (to the tune of 5 losses).

 

[HoustonSaint68]

Fun fact:. The 1991 Saints team led at some point in the 4th quarter of all 16 regular season games. Only the first game of the season were they behind heading into the 4th quarter. All too often the offense would go absent in the 4th and the defense couldn't hold up (to the tune of 5 losses).

Ouch.

 

[efil4stnias]

I was there. We sat so high up that after the fire, we were looking THRU the smoke to see field.lol

 

[HouseCall]

Something else to note about 1991. Prior to that season, the Niners had won the NFC West 8 of the previous 10 seasons.

Following this game, the Saints were 9-1 and the Niners were 4-6.

They finished the 1991 season winning 6 straight games, including a 52-14 win over a playoff Bears team to end the year. We finished the season 2-4.

They finished 1 game out of the division lead and tied with Atlanta for 2nd but missed the playoffs due to being swept by the Falcons earlier in the year.

A lot of people believe that had the 1991 Niners made the playoffs they would have been a tough out and possibly challenged the Redskins.

Anyway, it’s just interesting that no matter how much you would think and hope and pray the Niners would falter back then, they’d always find a way to get rolling again.

I just bring this up as a reminder of how painful it was to grow up a Saints fan in the 1980s and 90s in the same division with a legitimate football dynasty and as a reminder that I NEVER take a Niners/Saints game for granted.

 

[Saint Kamara]

I also remember the 9-3 start to the season (89) and then we lost 3 straight and people were seriously questioning whether the Saints receivers were purposely sabotaging Hebert and running wrong routes as he was having terrible games in that 3 game stretch.

Anybody else remember this?

So tragic as this was the beginning of a dominant 4 year stretch by the defense that was wasted as we ended up missing the playoffs.

The next season we lose Hebert to FA and we are even more inept on offense with Walsh. Another wasted season as we lost to the Bears in the playoffs (the famous blocked FG for a game typing TD that was called back incorrectly).

 

[HouseCall]

I also remember the 9-3 start to the season (89) and then we lost 3 straight and people were seriously questioning whether the Saints receivers were purposely sabotaging Hebert and running wrong routes as he was having terrible games in that 3 game stretch.

Anybody else remember this?

So tragic as this was the beginning of a dominant 4 year stretch by the defense that was wasted as we ended up missing the playoffs.

The next season we lose Hebert to FA and we are even more inept on offense with Walsh. Another wasted season as we lost to the Bears in the playoffs (the famous blocked FG for a game typing TD that was called back incorrectly).

I don’t remember a ton about the 89’ season aside from the Fourcade flourish at the end of the season that led to Finks playing hardball with Hebert in the offseason - which in turn led to his holdout, necessitating the trade for Walsh in 90’. That was a terrible offense with a really good defense and ended with the gutsy but anemic playoff loss in Chicago.

The 92’ season was a great shot at taking the next step but 12-4 was only good enough for 2nd place behind the Niners and we lost that frustrating game to the Eagles.

The 93’ season was the post Hebert season with Wade Wilson as QB. We dominated early to go to 5-0 and then the wheels came flying off in Pittsburgh and stayed off for another 7 years. We finished 8-8 and never had another non-losing season under Mora.

I loved the Mora Saints - but man, could they be frustrating.

 

[FloridaSaintsFan]

Imagine if the cowboys traded Aikman and kept Walsh like some wanted to

 

[Saintman2884]

Something else to note about 1991. Prior to that season, the Niners had won the NFC West 8 of the previous 10 seasons.

Following this game, the Saints were 9-1 and the Niners were 4-6.

They finished the 1991 season winning 6 straight games, including a 52-14 win over a playoff Bears team to end the year. We finished the season 2-4.

They finished 1 game out of the division lead and tied with Atlanta for 2nd but missed the playoffs due to being swept by the Falcons earlier in the year.

A lot of people believe that had the 1991 Niners made the playoffs they would have been a tough out and possibly challenged the Redskins.

Anyway, it’s just interesting that no matter how much you would think and hope and pray the Niners would falter back then, they’d always find a way to get rolling again.

I just bring this up as a reminder of how painful it was to grow up a Saints fan in the 1980s and 90s in the same division with a legitimate football dynasty and as a reminder that I NEVER take a Niners/Saints game for granted.

What's even more interesting is that we barely won our first NFC West division title that season, going into Week 17 of the 1991 season, Atlanta actually had a better intra-conference record then we did and had they beaten Cowboys, we'd played them in old Atlanta-Fulton Stadium, a stadium left for the-then new Georgia Dome. Dallas actually helped us win the division after upsetting Atlanta, our squad came out on fire vs. Phoenix Cardinals and IIRC, our defense and secondary played one of its best, overall performances of the Dome Patrol era, IMHO.

The 80s and 90s Niners teams were sort of a precursor to what Packers have been since early 90s with being blessed (and very lucky) to have two, future HOF QBs and loads of All-Pro talent dominating the opposition and developing into nearly a two-decade long dynasty. By the late 90s, perhaps 1997, SF began to show their age, lack of depth, mediocre drafts, an arrogant, egotistical but brilliant owner who allowed himself to get involved with a notorious, unreliable La. governor who only got elected to office in 1992 because while being a crook and unreliable liar, he was the far lesser evil to chose from then a former KKK Grand Wizard who used to wear Nazi uniforms while a student at LSU and during the Chicago 7 trials, paraded around signs proclaiming "Gas the Chicago Seven". Losing Eddie Debartolo and replacing it with less competent, not as intelligent owners like his sister and brother-in-law plus Steve Young retiring in 1999 brought the Niners long run to an end. Without Steve Young to assume the mantle and build his own HOF legacy, Niners dynasty ends around 1991 and maybe we win a few division titles, but then again we still have to deal with a resurgent Cowboys team and a young Brett Favre-led Packers beginning their slow rise to contenders.

I can't see us, with our convoluted, inefficient offense, even with such a great HOF defense, beating either one of those up-and-coming NFC powerhouses. It would've required Jim Mora opening up his offense to allow Hebert to be more of a potent passing weapon like he was capable of, and actually showed in 1993 with Falcons being voted to Pro Bowl. Mora, at least in his capacity as Saints HC, lacked the willpower, imagination, and creativity to make his system less rigid or hire someone to do the job. I don't think Mora believed Hebert or Walsh were capable QBs able to be potent passing threats.

I know he, as well as his coaching staff and the team, realized that Steve Walsh trade was terrible and he didn't have an NFL arm. Mora and Saints FO really hurt this team's long-term chances by playing hardball with Hebert in 1990. Finks made his biggest and probably worst mistake as an NFL GM ever with that one-sided deal to Cowboys for a mediocre, backup QB.

 

[Saintman2884]

I also remember the 9-3 start to the season (89) and then we lost 3 straight and people were seriously questioning whether the Saints receivers were purposely sabotaging Hebert and running wrong routes as he was having terrible games in that 3 game stretch.

Anybody else remember this?

So tragic as this was the beginning of a dominant 4 year stretch by the defense that was wasted as we ended up missing the playoffs.

The next season we lose Hebert to FA and we are even more inept on offense with Walsh. Another wasted season as we lost to the Bears in the playoffs (the famous blocked FG for a game typing TD that was called back incorrectly).

We didn't lose Hebert to FA, he just held out for an entire season because Finks and Mora thought Fourcade could continue his great play the last 3 games of the 1989 season and we could afford to lowball or ignore Hebert's demands for a raise. Finks said no and to compound the situation even worse, he mortgages our future for some mediocre, "well-regarded" Cowboys backup QB Steve Walsh.

. Jimmy Johnson tried to recruit Aikman to Miami as a college HC but failed but always believed if he'd had him at Miami, he would've won every game there by blowouts, which reveals a lot about his feelings towards his former Hurricanes starter, Walsh, a guy he didn't draft or really have faith in even while they were together in college. Johnson had his future HOF QB Aikman, he knew it but until 1991, Cowboys didn't have that mean, vicious personality on defense until acquiring Charles Haley in a trade. Once that piece came together, Dallas newly reformed dynasty was ready to roll for 3 Super Bowls in 4 seasons.

Finks, as great, and savvy in terms of being a negotiator and knack for problem-solving, had a long-held reputation for being cheap or playing hardball in renegotiating contracts with star All-Pro players in Minnesota and Chicago. He got away with it back in the 60s-early 80s because there was no salary cap or free agency NFL players had as options other then the CFL or USFL. He drafted Walter Payton and some of the core defensive stars of what would become the 1985 Bears, but he tried to win relying on sub-par QBs and not drafting key players for depth at other short-term needs.
In 1979, Finks turned down an offer to trade for Kenny Stabler, a 4-time Pro Bowler, with Oakland because he "was happy with the players we had" and if would've offered maybe a 3rd or 4th round pick for a future HOF QB. I'm not a big fan of the "Snake" but Finks reasoning here was bullshirt and idiotic and Stabler said as much in his autobiography.

Oh, but it gets better guys. Most Bears fans over the age of 55 will tell you that most Bears scouts had worked out and observed Joe Montana during combine workouts and were advocating Finks and Bears FO to draft Montana in April 1979, in fact most Bears players then, HC at the time, and his assistants genuinely believed that morning of draft day 1979, Montana would be a Chicago Bear.

Didn't happen and rest, as they say, is history.

Finks could build championship-caliber teams and he did in Minnesota and Chicago eventually after he left, and he succeeded in keeping them together there because of no FA or salary cap, but he had a bad problem of being cheap to keep those pieces in place and by the time he was GM here in New Orleans, Plan B free agency and a salary cap was being discussed to create parity between small-and-larger markets so he couldn't keep those great players anymore by playing hardball because now, they had feasible options and Bobby Hebert was one, stubborn SOB who called his bluff and acted out on his threat to sit out.

 

[Turfie]

This was my earliest Saints memory. I was 6 years old and raking leaves in the yard with my mom. My dad came outside with the biggest smile on his face yelling that the Saints just beat the Niners.

It was one of the very few Saints games that was TV in PA.

 

[Saint Kamara]

Imagine if the cowboys traded Aikman and kept Walsh like some wanted to

Walsh would have fit perfectly for that team and been the same game managing HOF QB that Aikman turned out to be. I'm pretty sure Walsh could have averaged 15 TD, 10 Int and 200 yds/gm passing a season. The year he started for us he went 8-3 with very similar stats to Aikman's career averages.

 

[KCWhoDat]

I was in the military in Iraq at that time....I missed a ton of games over the years. Thanks for the video. I remember wanting to see games so bad and couldn’t.

Edit...my bad, it was 1992 when I was shipped out. Getting old.

 

[Zack Lee]

Walsh would have fit perfectly for that team and been the same game managing HOF QB that Aikman turned out to be. I'm pretty sure Walsh could have averaged 15 TD, 10 Int and 200 yds/gm passing a season. The year he started for us he went 8-3 with very similar stats to Aikman's career averages.

I think Walsh had the same problem Danny Weurfel did. He didn’t have enough arm to make all the throws.

 

[Madmarsha]

The game was most memorable for a small fire up in the Dome rafters, caused by a fireworks display at halftime. Enjoy!

And the Saints haven't been able to have nice things since.